Carlo Alfano, Irma Blank, Dadamaino, Hanne Darboven, Mirtha Dermisache, León Ferrari, Marcia Hafif, Anna Maria Maiolino, Edda Renouf, Antonio Scaccabarozzi, Jan Schoonhoven

Alfabeti della mente

22 October – 07 January 2012

The subject of the exhibition that opens on the 22nd of October at 18.00, entitled Alphabets of the mind, is not Visual or Concrete Poetry, but Conceptual research at the boundary between writing drawings and drawing writing. As Angela Madesani points out in the introduction to the exhibition, The French linguist Roland Barthes claimed that «writing need not be legible in order to qualify as writing». Moreover, between the Sixties and Seventies, there were many artists on the international scene who made declarations and proclamations, strongly marked by ideological, and even more frequently politi- cal, affiliations. The protest is clear, outspoken. An attitude that is more often than not easy, explicit and fashionable. The pieces exhibited here go against all of that, but without being preconceived. We stand before pieces, created with traditional techniques, mostly on paper, which display a profound social and historical awareness, and above all an awareness of language. Nothing is ran- dom or ephemeral and every signifier takes on a real, typically unconventional, meaning. The exhibition includes over 40 works by 11 selected artists. In his Frammen- ti di un autoritratto anonimo, Carlo Alfano codes a grammar made of numbers, while the artist Irma Blank, who is German but has lived in Italy for almost fifty years, in both Eingschriften and Trascrizioni dedicates herself to the translation of the concept of the unspeakable. On display are the compulsive artificial writings by German Hanne Darboven and Dadamaino’s obsessive dictations in Alphabets of the mind and the more recent Sein und Zeit. South American artists include Mirtha Dermisache (Textos from the Seven- ties and the more recent Newsletters, in which artificial writing recovers its purely plastic dimension, are exhibited), Leon Ferrari (in whose work the letter and the text, told in a thousand ways, have a supporting role) and Anna Maria Maiolino with the Codificações Matéricas Series pieces, mental traces gener- ated by the force of gravity. The works of two American artists are also exhibited, Marcia Hafif (“mental exercises, which seem to record the mechanisms of thought”, writes Angela Madesani) and Edda Renouf, whose writing “is like an incision into the skin of the subject”. Antonio Scaccabarozzi invents laws that decode the alphabet and grammar of mental structures, made of single typewritten dots, while Jan Schoonhaven organises lines in the balance between approximation and rigour.

Exhibition Works

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Irma Blank, Eigenschriften, Untitled, 1970, pastel on cardboard, 46×38 cm
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Carlo Alfano, Untitled, 1979, Pen and pencil on paper, 30x40 cm
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Carlo Alfano, Untitled, 1979, Collage and pencil on paper, 63,8x48 cm
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Carlo Alfano, Untitled, 1983, Collage and pencil on paper, 48x63,8 cm
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Irma Blank, Eigenschriften, Spazio 98, 1970, pastel on paper, 68,5×50,5 cm
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Irma Blank, Eigenschriften, Pagina 52, 1972, pastel on paper, 70x50 cm
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Irma Blank, Trascrizioni, Kurz-Texte, 1973, indian ink on parchment like paper (8 sheets), 30×38 cm overall
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Irma Blank, Trascrizioni, Zeitungsdoppelseite, 1974, indian ink on parchment like paper , 31,5x43 cm
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Dadamaino, lettera 7 dell’alfabeto della mente, 1980, ink on paper , 25x18
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Dadamaino, lettera 9 dell’alfabeto della mente, 1979, ink on paper , 50x35 cm
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Dadamaino, lettera 10 dell’alfabeto della mente, 1979, ink on paper, cm 46x23
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Dadamaino, lettera 11 dell’alfabeto della mente, 1980, ink on paper, cm 70x50
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Dadamaino, lettera 12 dell’alfabeto della mente, 1979, ink on paper, cm 70x20,5
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Dadamaino, Sein und Zeit, 1998, ink on polyester , cm 109,8x63,8
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Hanne Darboven, 12 Variante, Id , 1975, ink on paper (17 sheets), 119,2×105 cm overall (var.)
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Hanne Darboven, Untitled, 1978, ink on paper 20,3×31,7 cm
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Mirtha Dermisache, Texto, 1970, Chinese ink on paper, 28x23 cm
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Mirtha Dermisache, Carta, 1970, Chinese ink on paper, 28x23 cm
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Mirtha Dermisache, Carta, 1973, Chinese ink on paper, (7 sheets), 56×92 cm overall (var.)
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Mirtha Dermisache, Carta, 1973, Chinese ink on paper, (7 sheets), 56×92 cm overall (var.)
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Mirtha Dermisache, Newsletter, 1999, Chinese ink on paper, 35×27,5 cm
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León Ferrari, Escritura, 1976, ink on paper, 46,5×33 cm
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León Ferrari, Un Ciego "La rosa Profunda" (Borges), 1997, indian ink and braille print on cotton paper, 47×37 cm
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León Ferrari, Untitled, 2007, pastelli e matita su carta, 34×24 cm
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León Ferrari, Untitled, 2007, ink on paper, 35,5×25 cm
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Marcia Hafif, February 16, 1972 I, 1972, pencil on paper, 60×45,5 cm
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Marcia Hafif, February 18, 1972, 1972, pencil on paper, 60×45,5 cm
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Anna Maria Maiolino, Untitled (from Codificações Matéricas Series), 1995, ink on paper, 44×31,5 cm
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Anna Maria Maiolino, Untitled (from Codificações Matéricas Series), 1995, ink on paper, 65,5×48,5 cm
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Edda Renouf, Miniature, two-5, 1975, incised lines and charcoal on paper, 22×17 cm
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Edda Renouf, Message-33 (eau), 1992, incised lines and pastel on paper, 25,5×25,5 cm
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Edda Renouf, Message-26 (feu), 1992, incised lines and pastel on paper, 25,5×25,5 cm
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Antonio Scaccabarozzi, dattilografia, 1970, type-written on paper on board, 29×30 cm
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Antonio Scaccabarozzi, cm.1/2, 1978, acrilic on paper, 24,3×23,3 cm
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Antonio Scaccabarozzi, cm. 3/2, 1978, acrilic on paper, 24×24 cm
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Antonio Scaccabarozzi, cm. 1/2, 1978, acrilic on paper, 24,3×23,3 cm
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Antonio Scaccabarozzi, 3 assente, 1979, acrilic on canvas on board, 30×29,8 cm
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Jan Schoonhoven, Drawing # 62 – 44, 1962, pencil on paper, 50x32,5 cm